When Wendy Brown was 33 years old, she did something most adults would never want to do: she went back to high school, posing as her daughter to enroll in classes in Green Bay, Wisconsin. When her ruse was discovered, police, administrators, and the public wondered what Brown was searching for by returning to the difficult days of high school.

In her first interview since her arrest, Brown told The Atlantic magazine that when she was in high school the first time, in the summer of 1990, she was an ambitious and talented runner on the track team in southwest Chicago. She was out running one day when she felt sick, bent over, and threw up. Soon, she discovered she was pregnant. While Brown dropped out of high school and went to work for Kmart and Wal-mart, becoming the mother of two kids in a few years, her siblings succeeded in school, and she resented them, she said.

In 2008, after friends had convinced Brown she was youthful looking and thin for her age, Brown decided to go back to school. As she registered with the school, she asked about cheerleading tryouts, attended them, and made the team. She says it felt “awesome.”

“I was like, ‘Wow, I’m in a cheerleader uniform.’ … It was like a trophy or award, like, ‘This is mine?’”

Within a few weeks, Brown was caught by administrators trying to find out more information about the new student they enrolled, and she was referred to police. She told authorities that she wanted to “regain a part of her life she had missed.” The court recommended psychological help. Brown is now living on her own again as a 33-year-old.